There comes a time when it’s too late to tell people how you feel.
There will come a day when the person you mean to talk to won’t be there. Don’t wait for that day.
“There’s always tomorrow” isn’t always true.
Overworked and Underappreciated
I once worked for a company that was so confused that, not only did I not meet my last immediate supervisor for 6 months, but he didn’t know what I did or who I supported. He was my supervisor on paper for payroll and organizational purposes only.
Does your boss know what you do?
More recently, I was called into my current boss’s office to get scolded for low productivity since I don’t produce as much as the other programmers.
That’s not my favorite thing to do in the afternoon. I’d rather spend the afternoon playing Angry Birds improving our software.
In response, I spent the week logging my time. Before I left on Friday, I sent my boss an email that started out with:
When we spoke on Monday, you compared my productivity unfavorably to the other developers. I don’t think that’s a fair comparison as I do more categories of tasks than the others. I don’t think you realize how many additional responsibilities I’ve taken on over the years.
I continued from there with a summary of each day’s work last week. The short version is that, while being productive, I spend less than half of my time on my primary job function because I’ve slowly taken on a managerial role.
I’m on vacation this week, so it will be a few days before I find out if my email will make a difference.
Now, this scolding was my fault. I know I spend my day doing much more than just writing code. I’ve told my boss that before, but I’ve never made sure he understands the scale of the extra work, and I’ve never proven it with a detailed log.
This was poor personal marketing.
In the future, I have to make sure that I keep him in the loop with a summary of the extra work I do, like the training, product demos, sales calls, and estimates I’m involved in.
We’ll see how well that works.
How would you handle a situation like this? Daily emails? Whining? Kicking a garbage can across the room?
Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-05-08
- The Festival of Frugality #278 The Pure Peer Pressure Edition is up. All of your friends are reading it. http://bit.ly/aqkn4K #
- RT @princewally: Happy StarWars Day!: princewally's world http://goo.gl/fb/rLWAA #
- Money Hacks Carnival #114 – Hollywood Edition http://bit.ly/dxU86w (via @nerdwallet) #
- I am the #1 google hit for "charisma weee". Awesome. #
Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-05-29
- RT @ramseyshow: RT @E_C_S_T_E_R_I_: "Stupid has a gravitational pull." -D Ramsey as heard n NPR. I know many who have not escaped its orbit. #
- @BudgetsAreSexy KISS is playing the MINUTE state fair in August. in reply to BudgetsAreSexy #
- 3 year old is "reading" to her sister: Goldilocks, complete with the voices I use. #
- RT @marcandangel: 40 Useful Sites To Learn New Skills http://bit.ly/b1tseW #
- Babies bounce! https://liverealnow.net/hKmc #
- While trying to pay for dinner recently, I was asked if other businesses accepted my $2 bills. #
- Lol RT @zappos: Art. on front page of USA Today is titled "Twitter Power". I diligently read the first 140 characters. http://bit.ly/9csCIG #
- Sweet! I am the number 1 hit on Ask.com for "I hate birthday parties" #
- RT @FinEngr: Money Hackers Carnival #117 Wedding & Marriage Edition http://bit.ly/cTO4FU #
- Nobody, but nobody walks sexy wearing flipflops. #
- @MonroeOnABudget Sandals are ok. Flipflops ruin a good sway. 🙂 in reply to MonroeOnABudget #
- RT @untemplater: RT @zappos: "Do one thing every day that scares you." -Eleanor Roosevelt #
Magical Thinking
A few weeks ago, on my way to work, while merging onto the highway, a soccer mommy in an SUV decided that she was going to accelerate to fill the opening I was going to use. Not before I got there, which would have left her in the right, if still a jerk, but as I was moving into the lane.
The entire reasoning was that she could be rude and dangerous under the assumption that I would be more civilized and back down, allowing her to indulge her little fantasy about how the world works. Luckily I saw her speed up, and had time to move out of the way. Physics very nearly taught her an expensive lesson.
This is similar to the people who think they’ll be safe because “nothing has happened before” or think “He won’t hurt me because I;m a good person” when confronted with a mugger.
This is magical thinking. Basing assumptions of other people’s actions on nothing more than your personal hopes and biases. The truth is, your halo does not provide a shield. Your luck at dodging criminals while strolling through bad neighborhoods does not circumvent statistical likelihood and your jerkface attempt to run me into a guard rail had better be backed by the stones to deal with a wreck.
Magical thinking, wishful thinking, and baseless hope are not rational methods of running your life. Criminals hunt for victims who wrap themselves in a smug, yet naïve, superiority. Murphy’s Law is waiting for someone arrogant enough to think that the laws of physics don’t apply when you’re commuting. The only rational means of predicting the behavior of others is to look at the signals they are actually producing.
Someone tentatively trying to squeeze into an opening in traffic is far more likely to submit to your passive aggression than the guy who merges with a turn signal and the gas pedal.
Someone in the park after hours in a hoody is more likely to hurt you than the guy in running shorts.
The guy lurking in the shadows of the parking ramp, refusing to make eye contact is a more likely mugger than the suit trying to find his Lexus.
A million years of evolution have given us an incredible ability to detect danger. A few hundred years of relative peace at the end of a few thousand years of relative civilization have not erased that ability, it has just convinced us to ignore our instincts under the mistaken assumption that all predators live in the jungle.
Fear has survival value. Don’t allow your rational brain to override your lizard brain completely. Let your fear keep you safe.
Find the Things That You Love
First, watch this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_BtmV4JRSc
“It’s not about what you love, it’s about how you love it. There’s going to be a thing in your life that you love, and I don’t know what that’s going to be…it doesn’t matter what that is. The way you love that–and the way you find other people who love it the way you do–is what makes being a nerd awesome. -Wil Wheaton”
In the video, Wil Wheaton gets asked to send a message about being a nerd to an audience members newborn baby, and he does.
Being a nerd isn’t about pocket protectors, or D&D, or chess club. Being a nerd is about finding something you love and loving it no matter what.
My son is obsessed with League of Legends and Minecrack. I don’t get it.
I don’t have to.
My wife and daughters are all horse, all the time. I don’t get it.
I don’t have to.
Growing up, we got our first computer when I was about 7. Thanks to 3-2-1 Contact magazine, I started programming it shortly thereafter.
A few years later, we got a computer that wasn’t Apples green-on-green monstrosity. My first instructions from my parents were “Don’t break it.”
It took me three days. I was 11.
At 14, I got sent to computer camp. Soon after, I was up all night writing code. I remember getting questioned when my dad got up for work. “Have you been on that thing all night?”
He didn’t get it.
He didn’t have to. It was enough that he didn’t stop me.
My obsession–and my parents’ tolerance for it–eventually led to a career that allows me to support my family.
In high school, I discovered roleplaying games.
NERD!
The friends I made there are my friends now, 15 years later. I rent a room to one of the first people I played D&D with. He introduced me to my wife.
My nerdy obsessions have formed the basis of everything I love today.
When you are raising your kids, or shaking your head at something your husband or wife is doing, just be happy that they have found something to love.
Don’t ever tell them they can’t love the things they love, and don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t love the things you love.
